SMITE Xbalanque AD Carry Guide

SMITE Xbalanque AD Carry Guide by TraumaHunter

Xbalanque is one of the biggest flavor picks in smite right now as far as ADC’s go.  He is the KING of certain game modes such as Arena and Siege but less valued in game modes such as Conquest.

General strategy

Kit discussion (How it works/How to use)

Dead of Night (PASSIVE)

Any enemy gods that Xbalanque kills increases his physical power permanently.

PHYSICAL POWER: 5  MAX STACKS:6  ABILITY:  Buff  AFFECTS:Self

Branching Bola

When Xbalanque toggles on this ability, his basic attacks deal additional damage. When the bola hits, it splits into 2 that hit enemies up to 30 units behind the target for 30% damage (On-hit effects do not apply). Pressing ability key again cancels toggle.

DAMAGE:10/20/30/40/50  ABILITY:Buff  AFFECTS:Self  DAMAGE: Physical COOLDOWN .5s COST 8/10/12/14/16 per shot

Poison Darts

Xbalanque shoots 10 darts in a cone in front of him, dealing damage with each one. An enemy can be hit by 3 darts, with the other 2 doing 30% damage. Enemies hit are poisoned, taking additional damage every .5s and are slowed.

DAMAGE PER DART:30/50/70/90/110 (+40% of your physical power)
POISON DAMAGE:10/15/20/25/30 (+20% of your physical power)POISON SLOW:4/8/12/16/20%  POISON DURATION:3s  ABILITY: Cone DAMAGE: Physical COOLDOWN  18/17/16/15/14s  COST 70/75/80/85/90

Rising Jaguar

Xbalanque rushes forward and then jumps into the air. While in the air, he fires darts at all nearby enemies, dealing damage to all in the area. Any enemies that were poisoned by Xbalanque take additional damage.

DAMAGE: 80/130/180/230/280 (+20% of your physical power) ADDITIONAL POISONED DAMAGE:  20% ABILITY: Area AFFECTS: Enemy DAMAGE: Physical RADIUS: 30 COOLDOWN 16s COST 60/70/80/90/100

Darkest of Nights

Xbalanque shrouds enemies in darkness for 3s. During this time, Xbalanque’s basic attack range and his movement speed are increased. At the end of the darkness, any enemy gods moving at the time are stunned.

MOVEMENT SPEED: 20/30/40/50/60% BASIC ATTACK RANGE INCREASE: 40ft STUN: 1.5s ABILITY: Area AFFECTS: Enemy COOLDOWN 90s COST 100

His passive:  It’s not the most amazing passive but in the very early stages and very late stages of the game it makes a pretty big difference.  When you get first blood it means you are doing slightly more damage which helps you ever so slightly secure more kills.  Mostly this just helps with your wave clear in the early stage.  Think of it as a reward for getting a kill.  In the very late game you will be doing more damage with your auto’s than other ADC’s will be and it helps you not only crit for higher damages but it will allow you to gain more lifesteal as a result of it.  Helps you push towers more etc etc.  It adds some MINIMAL value to trading for kills.  If you can suicide vs them 1v1 and get the kill it is sometimes worth it to gain the additional damage since the enemy doesn’t gain the same.  It makes some items such as Fatalis a more viable pickup since you aren’t reducing your damage output as much.  I often pick up Fatalis on XB for this reason – especially when you go transcendence.

His 1 is his steroid.  It’s a very unique steroid.  10/20/30/40/50 damage is identical to Rama’s burst  (which is apparently considered OP by many) and considering you can fire as much of it as you want so long as you have the mana to do so I think its more valuable than Rama’s which has a finite amount of shots.  You don’t even have to hit the enemy in order to do the damage since 30% of it will go to enemies behind in a V shaped pattern.  You don’t have to rely on aiming the V shaped pattern – it bends in order to hit the enemy.  Making it a great buff.  Recently it was changed that you can have it de-toggled by being CC’d which is frustrating but not game breaking.  It has a .5 channel time – so you must wait .5 seconds before you can auto.  It’s mildly annoying.  As for ranking this in order for it to become his wave clear I think it is entirely viable.  Especially in high level  play where his 2 and his 3 are easily punished by good players.  Both can be interrupted and as such his wave clear is considered some of the worst on an ADC.  By ranking up his 1 you gain comparable wave clear that can’t be interrupted and good box potential. It also leaves your 2 and your 3 to both be used as an escape measure.  If you plan on going down this route I think its worth noting that the effective clear you get caps off at around 3 points in my opinion.  since the mana costs are: 8/10/12/14/16  if you are spending more than 12 mana to fire your autos you aren’t’ gaining comparable damage to clear the wave.  I think trancendance is a good and viable pickup for this style of play – if you can get transcendence built in full then you can begin to rank up your 1 further.  In the early stages I think people have a good idea after playing with Rama how much 50 extra damage means on an auto attack (it means more than people think!)  Worth noting this form of wave clear becomes hard to manage last hits unless you are used to how much damage you will be doing to the minions and can keep track of which minions need to be hit.

His 2 Is his classic form of wave clear.  You stand as if you were anubis aiming his 1 on the wave (to the left or right of it) and fire the darts in a manner of attempting to hit all of them.  The problems:  It is interruptible.  You can be stunned/mez’d etc during the cast of this ability and it stops firing the darts.  A good kbk can effectively shut down most of his wave clear potential with good timing.  It also does not easily hit all minions.  There are tricks to getting ALL of the minions to be hit but it will take many many many games before you are able to do such tricks consistently and quite frankly I’m not good enough myself to do such tricks consistently.  Most of them involve leading the minions around your melee minions by taking aggro from them and in doing so you put them in a vertical line instead of a horizontal one.  Almost as if they cup around your melee.  Doing this allows the front to be hit by your 2 in full force while aiming for the back minions.  Most people just opt to kill melee or archers with poison because its easier and you can poke the enemy god in this manner as well.  Because of these reasons though,  it is hard to manage your last hits unless you have a deep understanding of him.

His 2 is also his most common harassment as well though.  It provides not only a DOT but a 20% slow for 3 seconds.  This might seem small but if the enemy ADC is auto attacking you in a boxing match they are brought to a standstill so for 3 seconds you can dodge their shots and hit yours.  Should the enemy use their buff/debuff you can retreat with your 3 and dish bonus damage if they are poisoned and then wait out for the next boxing match.  The key to winning a boxing match with XB is to only box when the odds are in your favor.  The same can’t really be said for gods like AMC or Anhur (which are boxing characters that should want to box even if they don’t have perfect conditions because of not only their raw DPS but because of their sustain with hives or promised damage with stuns/slows/cripples.)  If the enemy has their steroid up – you should wait until their steroid is down unless you can out DPS them and you are confident you can do so.  YOU CAN NOT overlook the extra damage you get by hitting them with multiple darts.  Either by shotgunning it in their face to secure the extra darts or by swiping your mouse in order to bunch up your darts.  (similar to a bastet swipe in order to hit a minion wave – you fling your mouse to make the darts spread out more or bunch up more, you obviously want to bunch them up in order to make more hit the enemy.  Just go into practice and fire his 2 while swiping your mouse in order to understand what I am saying.)

His 3 is a dash with CC immunity at the top.  This is important to learn how to master because its basically a  timed beads for certain ults.  For example an Ares ult.  If you are at the top of your jump/dash when the pull it supposed to happen – you will not get pulled.  Very valuable.  Same goes for timing an Artemis ult.  If you do your dash as soon as tusky comes out you can not only dash out of its radius but you can also be CC immune to it and turn it into nothing but damage.  His 3 is USUALLY how people secure kills with him – he can fire over minions and dive towers to dish the damage and only take 1 shot from it.  BEWARE you can be body blocked during this ability – it is NOT a leap.  You can not traverse over minions during it.  It does great burst damage in conjunction with his 2 (which provides a 20% damage bonus on 280 at max rank – another 56-70 damage).  It is the main reason why he is so strong in team fights since he can suddenly dish 350 damage to the entire enemy team with a CC immune dash.  This ability makes him king of the crop in Arena and Siege for this reason (Assault too but to a lesser extent since sustain is more valuable in that mode).

His Ultimate is very unique.  It is how you will be gaining an advantage in the laning phase if there is a stalemate.  It has some unique combination effects with Bacchus as well.  If Bacchus ults the enemy all of the enemies that are drunk are forced to continue moving.  By forcing them to continue to move you force them to be hit by the 1.5 second stun.  It’s a nifty little combination.  But the REAL benefits to this ultimate are the mega range increase on his basic attacks and the global assist gold/xp you can gain.  You can seriously snipe for miles during its duration – in combination with crits late game you can 2 shot the enemy scylla in the middle of all their allies and their allies won’t even be able to see it happening because they are blinded – the scylla usually won’t understand what is happening and will stand still to avoid the stun – confident they are protected by their allies.  The satisfaction to be gained from this is limitless.  Also worth noting that if you have enough communication or even enough awareness you can gain an edge in a stagnant lane.  You can ult when you see the allied jungle about to gank solo and gain xp and gold from the gank across the map.  Especially helpful if you are behind and no where near as complicated to time as a Neith ult.

Wave clear strategy As mentioned earlier he has several “viable” methods of clearing the wave.  You can either put a few points into his 1 and go transcendence route.  You CAN go golden bow start and sell it off later if you are vs a really strong push like AMC.  This will help you in the early game but ultimately it is a flavor pick.  I only recommend picking it up in casual matches since it doesn’t always pay itself off effectively and lets face it – your league buddies will be mad with you for ‘breaking cookie cutter meta’.  Your bolas no longer proc’s 2x with golden bow so its not as strong as it once was.  It’s viable but its not ideal but feel free to experiment with it and find what you are most comfortable with – I look forward to the day that someone out there takes golden bow and roflstomps in a tourney and then the world decides “its viable again!”.  So don’t stop experimenting with what you like best.  Your 2 and 3 can both be leveled up to clear the wave as well.  Your 3 is more effective and easier to aim but leveling it up to wave clear also burns your only escape in order to do so.  So I recommend that you only do so if you are confident in your map awareness and wards/ if they don’t have gods with globals like Thor.  I think leveling your 2 and clearing the melee and archers separately while harassing the enemy as much as possible is your best method of wave clear.

Harassment and avoiding harassment His harassment is very good.  Every one of his abilities excluding his ult are tailored to harassment.  His 1 being used to clear the wave ensures damage on anyone who gets near friendly minions.  His 2 is used to clear the wave and hit people who AREN’T hiding behind minions.  Alternating between his 1 and 2 to clear the wave ensures maximum damage no matter where they are hiding.  And his 3 is just bonus damage should you feel the need to use it or secure the kill/improve your wave clear.  Not to mention you can do it relatively easily.  You ARE burning your main escape in order to do this though.  So do it only when confident in positioning and awareness.  He has a slow on his 2 to prevent harassment from advancing.  Most players don’t want to take the darts to the face.  His 3 is good at running away and dishing damage while doing so.  His 2 is great for backtracking and firing because you will be dishing damage.

His whole kit is harassment and avoiding harassment.  Learning this and understanding this is the key to XB in the laning phase.  You WILL NOT be clearing faster than the enemy without specific god conditions such as an Aphro support or an enemy having poor clear as well such as a Cupid.

Itemization specific to the god

Both Deathtoll and Devo gloves 1 + green/blue pot start and Devo gloves 2 start are the most common builds you will see on XB.

I’m more partial to the Death toll because I see XB as a very mana hungry god.

Non typical builds that are viable given certain conditions and playstyles:

Trancendance rush.
Golden bow 2 start.

A typical build could look like:

Deathtoll -> Devo gloves -> Pen boots -> Executioner -> Rage -> Situationals

Or

Deathtoll -> Devo gloves -> Pen boots -> Qins -> Rage / Titans -> Situationals

Or

Devo gloves -> Pen boots -> Executioner -> Rage -> Situationals

Or

Trancendance -> Boots -> Crits / Situationals -> Fatalis -> Remaining Situationals or Crits

Situationals: Titans bane, qins, Executioner, Deathbringer, fatalis, blood forge, Transcendence, Defensive item (such as magi blessing), Jotuns, Asi, Malice, Brawlers Beatstick, Witchstone.

The most uncommon thing you will see about his build compared to other adc’s is if you are picking up transcendence on him in order to use bolas often.  I think its a very viable pick up in any situation and is just a playstyle choice.  Your late game will be much stronger but your sustain will be less in the early stages (less lifesteal) – if you are harassing enough your enemy ADC will just want to farm though.  Kill potential on XB with his dash up is very little without a hard combo such as anhur pillar stun into ultimate with his leap still up and burning beads/sprint to catch up.

It’s important to note that I’m not here to hold your hand with these build suggestions – the build is only ONE part of success with a god.  You should read each item if you understand them and begin to understand why someone would pick up an item over a different item.  At the end of the day you want some crit, some lifesteal, some pen, and some attack speed.  If you can make up for the lack of attack power in fatalis by picking up a superior attack power item such as Transcendence then it becomes more viable.  If you can make up for lack of attack speed in not getting qins by going executioner (which is cheaper and comes more in handy later in the match) then thats why people pick it up.  No one is picking up executioner because they need that target pen right then and right there.  Usually at that point you are going to be boxing an enemy adc 1v1 at that point in time and ADC’s don’t build physical defense.  Sure you will do some damage to the enemy tank easier but executioners doesnt give you tower pen – only goldfurry/firegiant pen.  People are usually picking it up for the cheap attack speed and so that they can have the pen for late game when they do need it.

Level priority

His level priority is based on your build/preferences.  If you start transcendence and are using your 1 to clear then obviously rank up your 1 two or three times and then max your 2/3 accordingly.

I see no benefit to ranking your ultimate up unless you are seriously using your ult to run away 80% of the time from the enemy jungler ganks.  Ranking it up only gains you movement speed during his ult (which doesn’t last very long..)

I often find its easier to just rank his 2 and 3 up equally because it not only guarantees a balanced offensive/defensive capability – but ensures his most secured damage.  If you can’t hit your 2 because they hide behind minions and you aren’t ranking up your 1 for the chip then having your 3 hit them still ensures a good amount of damage.  If you put too much of your levels into your 3 but use it to escape then you aren’t securing enough damage with your 2.

For these reasons I rank it up situationally and XB is one of the few gods that I can say this for.

Alternate roles: (IE: Solo, Jungle) XB is a pretty meh Jungle.  He CAN do it.  But there is very little reason to do so over a typical jungle.

Jungle start is: Bumbas, red pot, hog. Ranking up your 2 and 1 are how I level up – the 2 for the slow and damage on minions – the 1 to secure the kills and sustained gank damage and clear speed.  Mages are juicy food that you can kill from a range (vs most assassin jungles having to close the distance before dishing damage – XB and other ADC’s can dish it from afar.)  His ult snipe is great but just not really much more than a situational kill on an enemy who doesnt understand his kit well enough.

I don’t really recommend him for the solo lane either to be honest.

Matchups VS other ADC’s (1v1)

• VS AMC: AMC can and WILL out push you early game.  If he is ranking his hives it will negate your poison damage and slow.  His ult cancels out your escape during its channel time.  And quite frankly its a horrible matchup for you – you are aiming to be a late game boxer.  I highly recommend ranking up your 3 first and trying to chip him enough that he becomes afraid of you (for absolutely no reason).  Be sure to get sprint 2 asap in order to escape honey should he cripple your dash.  This is a rough matchup.
• VS Artemis: She will be poking you..And poking you hard (its what she does) You need to rely on lifesteal to remain in as long as possible.  If you are using your 2 to clear the wave it makes you predictable for the poke with her 3.  For this reason I suggest you do it in odd places just barely out of range or use your 3 to clear the wave mostly and be diligent with wards.  Of course you REQUIRE early beads in order to do this.  Her ult combination + root will kill you.  No doubt without your 3 to escape.  But she is relatively squishy herself so her poke and your poke will often cancel out.  Becomes a big battle of chicken in lane.
• VS Anhur: Your dash negates his 1 – so you have a slight advantage in that department.  But your 2 will be a good harassment tool for him.  Your 1 is good poke since he must go to the minions in order to hit the wave.  Late game you are both boxers – your advantage lies in the ability to hit the entire enemy team instead of him only being able to hit 1 though.
• VS Cupid: Beware his level 1-5 damage its dangerous – but you both have comparable wave clear – if you can time your 3 to avoid the stun on his heart bomb you will have an advantage in lane.  Late game you bring more utility too.  His ult WILL stop your 3 in its tracks – be careful.  But you get an early sprint/beads and you shouldn’t have to worry anymore – don’t forget your ult provides a movement speed buff which can help you get out of his radius faster.
• VS Neith: She CAN out push you if she doesn’t care about her mana consumption.  Her ult and yours are both global so you both negate on that front.  She will heal up most of your poke so you will have to rely on burst damage in order to kill her – you probably won’t kill her 1v1 if she knows how to play Neith.  But she can’t really kill you either if you have your dash up.  I highly recommend aiming for mid/ late game on this matchup.
• VS Ullr: Avoid his 1 in ax stance and you should have better harassment.  His wave clear will be stronger in early/mid game but thats pretty typical for xb.  Hitting him with your 1 while he clears wave is encouraged.  It’s free damage and hes not really big on sustain in early stages.  If you go into predictable places to clear the wave with yoru 2 expect to take an ax – you can bait it and make him waste mana though.  Depends on how good you are at juking.  So long as you are harassing him properly and avoiding the stun you should be fine.  95% of Ullr players refuse to fire their 3 unless the enemy is stunned because “they might miss” or something of that nature.  So I like to take advantage of this and lay on the harassment.
• VS Apollo: He can mez your 2 and 3 and ruin your wave clear – it depends how good a player he is and how good he is at understanding minion aggro.  Ignoring this I think its important to harass him past his lifesteal potential.  You will be able to use your 1 to hit him while he wave clears.  Your ult can help with his ult since they are both global – but his has an advantage in the late game certainly.
• VS Rama:  He is fairly new so this matchup is half theorycrafting and half actual XB vs Rama experience.  You have a better matchup than you would think.  Early game your harassment is a real pain for him.  Your 1 can hit him while he arrows the minions.  He has relatively squishy stances and your 3 can chase his dash.  Your 1 and his 1 cancel each other out damage wise – his 1 is a slow that can be fired through minions and yours can only fire through minions situationally though.  So effectively a lot of your advantages that you gain vs other adc’s are negated by Rama.  You have more team fight potential and he has more 1v1 potential than you do.

Laning phase matchups (Duo lane from ranks 1-5 specifically usually) Picking up a god like Aphro or a support who can contribute to the wave clear safely like Ymir without too much cost to their mana helps with gods like AMC who really out push him hard.  His harassment doesn’t work too well with KBK since KBK mez doesn’t help with gods like AMC or XB who have DOT in their kit. CC is great for XB burst I actually value slows that allow you to hit autos more than stuns since XB can hit his abilities fairly easily and slows will ensure your autos land and typically last longer than stuns do in the early stages.  Your passive is important to remember – hopefully your support ensures you are the last to hit the god whenever possible in order to maximize your damage output.  Beware gods like KBK or Geb who can easily interrupt your channeled abilities and hurt your wave clear potential at very little cost to themselves.  Geb shield is also pretty annoying for your 3’s damage in the mid game. (early game it means nothing though).  Your CC immunity at the apex of your 3 helps for gods like Ares where you are forced to get early beads though.  Just be sure to punish their harassment with harassment of your own though!  Else you are in for a rough game.  A small side note – if I’m ever put with a god with a strong level 1 such as Ymir with duo lane on the left I often like to go Deathtoll, red pot, boots 1 start and pretend to do blue.  You  then both run down to the enemy blue and steal blue/kill the tank/cut off the enemy adc and kill them.  I see it as a worthwhile investment because of XB’s passive.  That first blood really is worth the chance at failure.  You can always forfeit your advanced positioning to do your blue (you will be out pushed regardless more than likely tbh so you don’t really hold much more than a 1-2 wave advantage.)  I see redpot start as being viable only vs players who either don’t have a good understanding of XB’s damage, casual matches where you are more confident in your support than in theirs, and matches vs gods that aren’t good with your harassment (IE: a Neith /AMC is NOT a good match to do redpot.  But a Rama or Ullr I think would be perfectly acceptable so long as you KNOW the matchup and how to play against those gods.

General Strengths and Weaknesses

Strengths

• Lifesteal potential is increased with flat damage on his Bolas (Does not apply to on effect hits IE: the bolas)
• He can snipe people under tower and even attack the tower taking no aggro with his ult active.  His 3 is also good at diving and taking minimal damage.
• His passive helps snowball
• Objective damage increased with his 1 at a flat rate – very useful.
• DOT helps secure kills on gods like Freya that banish themselves into the sky
• CC immunity on his 3 at its apex
• Global ult helps secure kills at no effort to yourself – helps you gain an advantage in a stagnant laning phase or to catch back up when behind.
• High harass potential and burst damage.
• EXTREMELY high team fight damage potential – highest of any ADC.
• Strong late game damage in comparison to other ADC’s

Weaknesses

• Most gods out push him in laning phase
• Reliance on channeled abilities to clear the wave/escape.
• Ult doesnt last long so you have to have good aim to make use of its extended range
• Ult is pretty easy to avoid the stun.  If you stand still for .25 seconds you don’t get stunned.
• Very mana heavy start.
• You must make the last hit in order to gain damage with his passive.  Assists where you did 99% of the damage don’t count.
• Part of his secured wave clear is his escape.  Using it half hazardly is dangerous..
• You can avoid his harassment from his 2 by being behind minions.  And movement with his 3 can be body blocked by minions.
• A high risk high reward god.  Most of his potential isnt really seen until mid/late game with team fights going on.

Split push potential, Objective solo potential

Pretty strong objective potential with his 1 ranked up a bit since its flat damage.  His 2 is max damage with shotgun.  I think he is not S tier objective solo – but certainly A tier.  His tower split push is kind of meh since his escape is meh.  He CAN fire off 2-3 hits on tower with ult in order to not take damage from it by firing outside of its range… but its a waste of an ult tbh.

Other game modes other than Conquest (Siege, Assault, Arena)

THIS is where XB shines.  He is EASILY S+ tier in Arena and S tier in Siege/Assault.  All of his kit is tailored for team fights.  A GOOD chunk of his damage is in his abilities as opposed to other ADC’s that rely HEAVILY on Autos and accuracy.  XB is not the same.  Even if you can’t hit them – you can fire at minions in order to secure damage on the enemy.  At max rank with his 2 and 3 hitting 5 players perfectly (admittedly not easy..) you can dish: 8575 in less than 3 seconds spread out evenly among 5 gods. (not including protections).  This is obviously just on paper and with perfect conditions, but it is just an example of what his damage potential CAN be – even HALF of that would be amazing.  And he can do it every 15 seconds.

In assault I recommend going Stone of Gaia if they have 3 or more Mages.  Most of your team damage will be in abilities not autos for a long time so you really aren’t missing out on major DPS regardless.  You gain HP5 to stay in the fight and mana to use your abilities.  Not to mention 70 mage defense will be a godsend for their mages.
If they are beefy I recommend qins start for strong sustained damage even in early stages of the game.

In siege he is great for the same reasons as arena since it has a larger emphasis on team fights.  Also he can be paired in lane with someone to help his wave clear and he can focus on harassment even more.  His ult is great for jungle ganks and he has a steroid that helps push towers and kill siege minions even faster in early stages of the game at expense of mana.

Closing thoughts and next week’s guide

Xbalanque is a stronger god than people give him credit.  He is hands down king of the crop in alternative game modes such as Arena and with a few QOL tweaks (such as his 2/3 not being interruptible and his bolas no longer disabling when you get CC’d) he could see a lot more play in conquest.   I think my biggest advice to players is that : If you have blue – you really need to make the most of it.  You NEED to be aggressive with your abilities and make the enemy regret trying to push their wave.  It is like you are playing solo baka or hebo.  You need to attack the enemy and harass them so that they don’t want to get near you.  Also – use your 1 to help clear the minion waves.  The extra damage really helps you clear around 60-75% faster vs just using autos (because you are doing 60-75% more damage total)  If you time your hits right and can secure 2-3 minion kills with a single hit then you are actually gaining 1-2 seconds on your wave clear and while that sounds pretty meager and pointless – it is the difference between having 2 archers run at you while you are backtracking and having the enemy adc throw 2-3 pot shots at you or you forfeiting the lane positioning you are currently in.  So use your blue!  My other piece of advice is to not be afraid to break free from current cookie cutter ADC builds on XB.  Transcendence is actually a pretty darn good item for him – I know lots of pr0 MLG super star players don’t like it because “its expensive” and other reasons.  But honestly even the best XB player will have issues getting kills vs a competent Neith who is leveling properly and understands her kit – instead of exerting so much effort into killing a god that is so hard to kill with his kit – I honestly think it is more valuable to just aim for the mid/late game and let them have their time to shine for now.  Once you get to team fights you will be infinitely more useful than she will be.  (I mean that in the nicest way Neith players!)